Kitchen language

[ailbhe]

[Poll #1104313]

Comments

kitchen towels

[nitoda]

I usually have a small towel in the kitchen for hand drying as opposed to dishes drying - it's a real towel, not just a roll of paper kitchen towels which I call Kitchen Roll.

Re: kitchen towels

[juliet]

I have one of these but wouldn't call it a kitchen towel. Although I wouldn't call kitchen towel that, either, I'd call it kitchen roll. But if someone asked for kitchen towel, I'd pass them the kitchen roll.

[sidheag.livejournal.com]

The thing most people describe as "kitchen towel" is "kitchen paper", in my dialect.

[laura0141.livejournal.com]

I call the paper kitchen towel on a roll thing 'kitchen roll' as opposed to 'toilet roll'.

[oldbloke.livejournal.com]

For "kitchen towel" I immediately started typing "absorbent paper" then added the "hand towel" bit when the amibiguity introduced by saying "towel2 instead of "roll" hit me

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

For me, a "dishcloth" is for washing dishes, a cloth for drying dishes is a "dish towel" and the rolls of towels made out of paper are "paper towels." The same paper towels are used for kitchen purposes, washing glass if you're not using a rag, wiping up cat puke, cleaning the kitchen sink, and so forth -- they don't have separate names depending on the room they're in. I buy them in bulk, and take them out of the same bag when I put them into the kitchen or the bathroom.

[taimatsu]

I wish to note that in my idiolect a 'J-cloth' is different from all of the above, and I don't personally use the things I think of as dish-cloths.

[ailbhe]

J-cloth is a brand name, in my world. And I think they're rubbish cloths, actually.

[taimatsu]

They were generically called J-cloths in my childhood. They are pretty rubbish, actually - I believe they are 'supposed' to be used for household cleaning, but they are not very absorbent so they don't do the job well. I default to using paper towel, which is rather wasteful - I should try some of those cleaning-sponge things you can buy now and see if they are better. I sometimes use ordinary dish-sponges for cleaning other things, especially as you can buy them extremely cheaply in pound shops now.

(P.S. I have been very slack, but your card has hit tonight's evening post - I know because I greeted the postman - and it's first-class so ought to be with you very soon. Apologies for the delay.)

[sashajwolf.livejournal.com]

They were generically J-cloths in my childhood, too, and dishcloths were the fabric things for drying up with. This caused some confusion when I started living with djm4, hence my less-than-serious answer to the second question :-)

Re: Kitchen language

[pir-anha.livejournal.com]

i kinda like their canadian equivalent - they're ~30x50cm and very thin, yes? i use the hell out of them, until they fall apart. basically i use them instead of papertowels (which is what you'd apparently call kitchentowels or kitchenroll -- a roll of absorbent paper in pre-stamped sheets that you can just rip). we have those, but i mostly use them for cat puke or the like, where i want to wipe the stuff into the towel and throw it all away. as opposed to spills, where i wipe and then rinse the jcloth. i use it for washing dishes when they're not very dirty and need no scrubbing power, and for all sorts of light cleaning duty.

their main drawback is that they're not veryabsorbent when dry, they just push the liquid around then; they need to be moist. also, they get manky, but i just toss them in with a bit of sink laundry and that freshens them right up.

i am not entirely sure why i like them better than dishcloths, but i do. it might just be that i can squeeze them out with one hand while a dishcloth needs two.

[naath.livejournal.com]

I also know of "kitchen towel" meaning "hand towel in the kitchen" and "dishcloth" meaning cloth-to-dry-dishes.

Two points of confusion after reading the responses

[griffen.livejournal.com]

Okay, first point of confusion: why would you use a washcloth (which is made of terrycloth squares for the most part) to wash dishes? A sponge or brush works twelve times better. Washcloths are for use in the shower, on the body, not on dishes.

Second point of confusion: The paper things are called paper towels.

Re: Two points of confusion after reading the responses

[ailbhe]

Coming soon to an LJ Poll near you!

Re: Two points of confusion after reading the responses

[random-c.livejournal.com]

A dishcloth isn't a washcloth. A washcloth is a flannel. A dishcloth is more like knitted string, and is more old-fashioned than sponge or brush, but can also be handy for getting into awkward spaces.
Also, kitchen towel is not paper towels. Paper towels aren't joined together, they're folded things in a dispencer. Kitchen towel comes on a roll, and I find that the term is used interchangeably with 'kitchen roll'.
/two penn'orth

Re: Two points of confusion after reading the responses

[micheinnz.livejournal.com]

The paper things folded together in a dispenser are serviettes.

Re: Two points of confusion after reading the responses

[random-c.livejournal.com]

No no no, serviettes are folded square rather than oblog, made of softer paper, and used for things like handing out cake and giving out with the paper plate and plastic fork at a party buffet.

Re: Two points of confusion after reading the responses

[micheinnz.livejournal.com]

Those are _also_ serviettes.

[geekette8.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure whether your poll is asking for what those terms mean to the filler-inner, or what terms the filler-inner uses for those items.

To me:

- dishcloth is not a term I would use (I'd just call it a cloth) but it's an absorbent fabric thing used for wiping up spills, cleaning childrens' faces after food, wiping down kitchen surfaces etc. Maybe 6" square kind of size.

- teatowel is a thin piece of fabric with a hook so it can hang up, probably about 24" by 12" at a guess, so larger (and thinner) than a cloth. It's used for drying up dishes etc that have been washed by hand.

- kitchen towel is a hand towel that happens to live in the kitchen for drying hands etc.

- kitchen roll is absorbent paper squares on a roll used for anything you'd use a cloth for if the cloths are all in the wash, and wiping up assorted bodily fluids for easy disposal :-)

[geekette8.livejournal.com]

And I use a brush to wash dishes by hand, which is called a washing up brush. Not a cloth.

[tafagirl.livejournal.com]

I use a brush too and call it a dish-washing brush, I guess.

We also have a linen tea towel for dish-drying and disposable "kitchen tissue" for spills or to catch veg remains.

[kcobweb.livejournal.com]

I cut myself off - I'd say "dish towel" rather than "Kitchen towel", I think. And I dry my hands on it, or dry dishes or occasionally mop up big spills with one.

Anything paper is a "paper towel" to me.

[pauamma]

Not familiar with the idiom "dishcloth" - guessing by analogy with washcloth.

[dreamalynn.livejournal.com]

There wasn't enough space for me to note the difference between teatowel and kitchen towel in my world. For me, a teatowel is absorbent like a bath towel, but of a very soft terry cloth roughly half as thick as that used for bath towels. It's good for drying hands, surfaces and dishes in the kitchen.

A kitchen towel is made of a flat or perhaps woven/textured fabric, but isn't nearly as absorbent. It's okay for drying hands but very good for covering proofing doughs (that aren't going to expand beyond the top of the bowl) or baked goods, lining the breadbasket, that sort of thing.

The paper towel / kitchen towel dichotomy may be an "two nations divided by common language" thing. Here (in the US) it's paper towel if it's paper, whether on a roll or folded or anything else. The roll kind may be most commonly found in kitchens, but it's not marketed that way.

[hobbitbabe.livejournal.com]

Also, one can buy teatowels with souvenir printing on them.

[micheinnz.livejournal.com]

The paper stuff on a roll is "paper towel". We don't actually use the phrase "kitchen towel" -- we have a teatowel and a handtowel hanging on the back of the sunroom door, and a roll of paper towels in the thingy on top of the microwave.

[mecmom.livejournal.com]

let's see : absorbent paper on a roll: paper towel; towel for drying dishes, either light terry cloth or flat woven: dish towel; cloth for washing dishes, counters, spills, etc: dish cloth, or dish rag; tea towels are fancy things, maybe with embroidery on them that are put up for show (not in MY kitchen) and that stay put, untouched, until they become disgustingly dusty; folded absorbent paper to use at table: paper napkins

[oldbloke.livejournal.com]

"teatowel" is the one with the amusing picture printed on it.

[merryhouse.livejournal.com]

"kitchen towel" is the paper stuff which my dad calls "kitchen roll"
"*a* kitchen towel" is a (hand) towel that lives in the kitchen.

Here's another one: how many of you have a floorcloth? (and how many of you get really pissed off when someone uses your washing-up cloth on the floor? - or even on the surfaces: my sister has separate ones)

Spillchucker doesn't like floorcloth, so this could be interesting.

[minding-maura.livejournal.com]

dishcloth is for drying hands

teatowel is ornamental

kitchen towel is for drying wet golden paws after dipping in bucket of water due to wild romps in the creek outback.

[radegund.livejournal.com]

Very interesting! I seem to be in a tiny minority on all of these questions.

Our kitchen includes:
- Kitchen towel: ordinary small towel for drying hands (NOT dishes). Some of the ones we use were (I think) sold with dish-drying in mind, but they're emphatically not used for that purpose.
- Dishcloth: what you call a teatowel. I don't say "teatowel" myself, but I'm perfectly familiar with it. I seem to remember my maternal grandmother, or possibly her housekeeper, using "teacloth" to mean the same thing. Ours are mostly fairly nondescript; my parents' tend to be linen, with interesting things printed on them, and they get ironed, which if you ask me is beyond the call of duty.
- Kitchen roll: the paper stuff on a roll.
- Um ... we have about 20 small towelling cloths, used for wiping spills, sticky hands and faces, crumbs off the table, etc., but I don't really have a name for them. They'd be J-cloths if they were J-cloths, but they aren't, so they're not. If I wanted Niall to hand me one, I might just say "cloth", or "one of his [i.e. Unny's] cloths". He'd know what I meant.
- Floor cloth: separate category of cloth used to clean the floor or do other similarly dirty work (e.g. scrubbing out a cupboard). I do occasionally use the um ... cloths to wipe up small spills on the floor, but they get retired to the wash immediately afterwards so that I don't accidentally use them on a counter. (Hands and face get a fresh one, mostly.)
- Napkin / paper napkin: cloth / paper square used at table. What a lot of people call a serviette. (I do have odious class connotations for this one, I'm afraid - "serviette" is coded as Common in my reptilian brain.) We don't actually use napkins at the moment, but in the New World Order When Everything Is Fixed™, it's my aim that we will.

[ailbhe]

I knew you said dishcloth because I had to think fast when you asked about the one on our change mat (note to casual readers: we have a particular pattern, easily identifiable even in dim light, for use on the change mat. There is no risk that we'll use it to dry your teacup).

We used to iron them when Linnea was weeny because of our typhoid-ridden lifestyle but we stopped quite quickly, because we got cleaner and she stopped having chronic colic.

The mix of cloths for infants are "wipes" and it's clear from context whether we mean a bum one or a hands and face one. Sometimes we call them mopperuppers.

I am finding your classism hilarious! I call them napkins too and periodically wonder whether I could also start calling baby nappies napkins. But I am not aware of any secret class weighting lurking in my inner wossname.

Except that now I'm going to listen to see what Rob's parents call them. Oooh, I am evil.

(I have decided to start using our wedding present Irish Linen napkins for everyday use, because I can't find simpler nice cloth ones in the shops, they're all mixed fabric and seemingly primarily for show).